Five players tied for first in the New York International (June 19-23, 2009) ; Lev Milman made his third and final GM norm. GM Giorgi Kacheishvili beat IM Sam Shankland as black in the last round to catch him at 6.5/9 and (partially) derail Sam’s norm hopes. The early tournament leader, Filipino IM Oliver Barbosa, won his last game against Igor Sorkin to reach the magical 6.5 score and share $10,000, but ironically, failed to make a GM norm because he had not played enough non-U.S. Players. Zybneil Hracek and Alex Stripunsky drew each other to join the leaders. IM Lev Milman made his third and final GM norm by beating Leonid Yudasin in the last round (his sixth GM of the tournament). He now needs only to get his rating from 2480 to 2500 to be awarded the title. Immediately after his game, Lev was off to the airport to begin a two week backpacking vacation across Europe.

In the last round, IM Sam Shankland needed only to draw GM Kacheishvili with white to make his first GM norm. Happy with his position out of the opening, Sam felt that Kacheishvili’s experience with isolated queen pawn structures allowed the grandmaster to gradually outplay him into an equal endgame. Sam then played a tactic that didn’t quite work and his opponent found a “beautiful, sick win.”

Despite this, Sam seemed relatively optimistic Tuesday evening: “I hope I can lick my wounds from this game and come back and win in Philly.”

Compounding the frustration of losing was the knowledge of how close he had come to the norm. Sam’s opponents’ average rating was 2434.44444; had it been 2435, he would have been able to lose the game and still make the norm. If just one of Sam’s opponent’s had been one point higher rated, he would have secured the norm even losing the last game. Happily, FIDE has indicated that they will consider counting this result if Sam achieves two more unambiguous norms.

*As a non-US player, Barbosa needed to play three rather than four foreigners, but he got none in rounds 1-6, and then a forced pairing against Shankland in round seven ended any remaining possibility.

GM Jesse Kraai

Interview with Jesse Kraai

Elizabeth Vicary (EV): Have you played in NYC before? Jesse Kraai (JK): A couple times as a kid. Once I played the Cadet here; another time I came for a Mednis camp. When I was here as a kid I was always fascinated with New York as a chess city. It has such a rich, Russian-Jewish tradition of chess.

EV: What did you think of the tournament: the site, conditions, prizes, etc? JK: The site was fantastic, but the conditions were non-existent and the prizes were poor. I got six points, a really good result, and I still didn’t get money.

EV: Any impressions of the other players, did anyone surprise or impress you?JK: No one specifically. I think what you saw in this tournament is a general changing of the guard. You have your older players who are gradually fading. Like Jaan (Ehlvest) used to beat me down all the time, badly, but maybe he’s getting a little older… possibly I’ve improved too.
EV: Which was your best game? JK: Against Sarkar. I came up with a plan that put all my coconuts en prise. It was a strategic plan, not a tactical one, but it set some concrete problems that Sarkar was unable to solve.
It was the kind of plan you have to be insane to come up with. I’m not going to put it into the computer because I don’t want to know if it’s objectively right. I don’t usually put my games into the computer; it makes me lazy. It was a good move in a human game, and chess is always a human game.

EV: You and your housemates, Vinay Bhat and Josh Freidel, recently had a training session with Lev Psakhis. How did that go, what did it consist of, and can you feel any effects? JK: We went over a bunch of positions that Psakhis had already studied deeply, positions from a variety of sources: his games, Fischer games, etc. and we were asked to address specific questions in different positions.
The thing I really took away from it was that I was trying to calculate too much, at least in certain kinds of positions. Not only did I learn that it wasn’t possible to calculate certain positions, but that it was eminently unhelpful to even try.

EV: What do you do instead, then? JK: You have to have confidence in your own judgment.

Elizabeth Vicary, Irina Krush and Jesse Kraai at a restaraunt after the tournament.

EV: How’s it going in general at the “GM house”? JK: Before, we were studying 3-6 hours a day, 5 days a week, but recently the house personnel has been fluctuating so much because people have been traveling. When we all get back from the World Open, we will have to reevaluate how to approach studying. The lease is up in November, so we will have to consider things then as well, but in general I think it’s going well and will continue.

EV: What about you personally? What’s your five year plan? JK: I would like to lead an intellectual life: studying chess, reading, writing.

EV: What kinds of things would you write? Fiction? JK: A chess book, I’m thinking a collection of essays, something similar to the lectures I do for chesslecture.com, but in written form. I have some ideas… an essay about calculation, about Kasparov’s theorem (chess is the balance of time, material, and quality of position). I’m also interested in various segments of chess culture around the world. For example, in China last year we played the Iranian team, and there was one guy I talked to a bit. I just sent him a message on Facebook!

Sarkar neglects the participation of Ne2 in order to pursue his central ambitions, primarily because it is unclear how black will improve his position. 14...c5! Intending Bc6 which has two ideas: to threaten Ne4 (because Bc6 would be protected) and to open the white K with b5. The move is very unnatural because it looks like d6 will now be significantly weakened. 15.Bc2 Bc6 16.f4
White must now try to complicate the position because Ne2 is met by Ne4. Sometimes, when you don't bring one of your players off the bench it becomes increasingly more difficult to do so. [16.Ne2 Nxe4 17.Bxe4 Qxh4 18.Bxc6 Nxc6] 16...Ng6 17.Bxf6
17.e5 Nxh4 18.Rxd6 Qxd6 19.exd6 Bxg2–+
17...Qxf6 18.Qxf6 gxf6 19.f5 Nf4 20.g3 Ng2! 21.Rxd6 Bxe4 22.Nh3 Bxc2 23.Kxc2 Re2+ 24.Kb3 Rae8 25.Rhd1 Ne3 26.R1d2 Nxf5 27.Rxe2 Rxe2 28.Rd8+ Kg7 29.Nf4 Rxh2 30.g4
Realizing that Nd4 is a big problem, Sarkar tries to initiate some play against my K. 30...Nd4+ 31.Ka2 Ne6! 32.Nxe6+ fxe6